We always speak about the importance of Africans telling our stories and using our agency. That’s exactly what new bottle start-up, Calabash Bottles is trying to do. Inspired by an interaction with his grandmother over a decade ago, Kwame Wireko is trying to push Africa’s positive stories while working to change one particular issue that more wealthy natives of many African states may close their eyes, water infrastructure.
Through the sales of sleek minimalist bottles, the company intends on challenging dominant narratives of Africa in the West and raising money to institute sustainable water projects across the world with the first one scheduled to be in a village known as Maguye in Eastern Uganda.
Ghanaian native, Wireko first felt he must do something about poor water situations when he mistook water in a calabash for coffee because of its dark while on a trip to an Accra market many years ago with his grandmother. As is the case with many of our favorite ideas, he refined it as the years went on and finally acted on his early inspiration less than a year ago.
On November 1st, he presented the idea to the world via an Indiegogo page and is currently fundraising to take his dreams from thought to reality. The bottles which come armed with features like double vacuum insulated technology which keeps drinks at the same temperature for 48 hours, an infuser to brew coffee or other fruits and holds 500 milliliters, comes in five logo colors, Cyan, Gold, Pink, Space Gray and White and can be bought for $25 with the expectation that it will arrive in January 2018 if Calabash meets its lofty goal of $20,000 in the 30 day campaign period.
With every Calabash shipment is a note with one fact about Africa or one of its countries, its intentions are genuine and its actually a water bottle that sits in the same range in terms of quality as anything you’d find anywhere so you should definitely give it a chance.